


The First Run

by TardisTexan



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-25
Updated: 2014-05-25
Packaged: 2018-01-26 10:05:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1684433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TardisTexan/pseuds/TardisTexan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At the end of The Eleventh Hour, the Doctor says he's going to take the TARDIS to the moon.  Well, you know who lives on the moon, don't you?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The First Run

“I'll just pop to the moon and back, run her in a bit,” the Doctor said to Amy. He was so excited to fly his new ship he could hardly stand it. He was as enthusiastic as a kid on Christmas morning as he danced around the control panel, testing all the new buttons and gizmos. 

The ship made several orbits around the moon and then landed. The Doctor had no need to go outside. He knew what was on the moon, a big fat lot of nothing interesting. He checked the scanners, touching all the buttons, to confirm where he was. He was just about to head back for a peek around the interior corridors when a “Hello, Sweetie” filled his ears.

The Doctor froze. River. Future Wife, maybe. Probably. Maybe. 

“River, whatever are you doing here,” he said, trying to sound nonchalant.

“Me? You are the one parked in the middle of my back garden.”

“Your what?” the Doctor asked, spinning around to look at her. River was wearing a tshirt and jeans, with a pale yellow sweater. The jeans were tight and hugged her curves and he gulped. 

River walked up to him and was about to lean over for a kiss when she stopped short. She easily saw that this was a very young Doctor. She had dealt with a young Doctor way too often for her liking these days. Her smile brightened to hide her disappointment. “Oh, I see. Weren't looking to come see me at home then?”

“You live on the moon?” he asked confused, but quickly figured it out verifying the date on the scanner. “Oooohhh, Professor Song. Luna University, right?”

River nodded, looking at him warily. “Where are we?” she started to ask when the Doctor suddenly yelped in pain and crumbled to the ground.

He had been holding back the regeneration sickness the entire time he had been with Amy and the nurse with the funny nose. He thought he'd be able to come to the moon and sleep it off for a while, then take Amy on an adventure. He certainly wasn't expecting a visitor.

“Doctor?” River said worriedly, dropping to the floor next to him. “What's wrong?”

“Nothing, Nothing,” the Doctor said, strain in his voice as he tried to sit up. When River touched his hand to help him, a bolt of regeneration energy shot through them both and wound around the Doctor before dissipating. 

River gasped. “Regeneration? Did you just regenerate? How long ago?”

The Doctor gave River an irritated look. Of course she knew about regeneration. She knew about everything didn't she, Miss Smarty Pants. He opened his mouth to tell her to go away, when he doubled in pain again and almost passed out.

“Doctor, how long?” River asked again and she put his arms around her shoulders.

“Felt fine, felt great. Had fish fingers and custard with Amelia,” he mumbled as she helped him up. River helped him back into the TARDIS towards his bedroom. “Then Amy said 12 years and I started to feel bad. But only had 20 minutes to save Earth. Again. Had to... put on... a... show” his voice gave out as she opened the door of his bedroom. She got him in the room and out of his jacket before he collapsed on the bed. 

River sat next to him on the bed. She knew the story, of course. Amy and Rory and told her, and the Doctor had told her. He hadn't told her about this part though. 

She reached out and lovingly removed his tie. His very first bow tie. She touched it to her lips softly and then laid it aside. As she undressed him, her eyes ran over his body, his brand new body. It was so familiar to her, but it wasn't to him. She ran her fingers through his hair, his new hair that he didn't know he liked yet. He didn't know that his neck just under his ear was very sensitive. He didn't know how he would shiver when anyone touched his lower back. He was brand new, and River was sad.

River felt silent tears touch her cheeks as she put her so very young husband in his pajamas and tucked him into bed. She knew that he would be fine, he would just need to sleep off the sickness. So why was she crying? Was this the last time she would see him in this body? Her Doctor, her husband, in the body he had married her in? He had long since disproven her strict back to front theory, but she still felt that fear. Is this first her last? 

This was the first time he was seeing her with these eyes, but he had obviously known who she was. So apparently she still had the Tenth regeneration to meet. But how would she react to him? How would he react to her? That day, that day when she would meet him and he would have no idea who she was was coming and it was coming fast.

River bent down and pressed a kiss to the sleeping Doctor's lips. The flood of regeneration energy she felt was no where near as powerful as when she had brought him back to life with her kiss, but it was warm and comforting and familiar. “I love you, Sweetie” she whispered and hoped it wouldn't be the last time she got to say it.

\----------

The Doctor woke 29 hours later. He was in his pajamas, the same ones he had worn many times before but everything felt different. _He_ was different. He stood in front of the mirror in the bathroom examining his new face, new hair, new everything. Young, quite a young face this time. Floppy hair, long gangly limbs. “Blimey, that chin is quite something, isn't it?” he said to himself in the mirror, turning for a profile. 

He went back out into his room in search of his clothes. River had folded them neatly on a chair, with the bow tie on top. _River_. River had brought him back to his room and apparently undressed him. He found himself blushing at the thought. “I guess I blush now,” he said and sat on the bed. He wondered _Is this the face River falls in love with?_ She had known about regeneration, so she must have seen it at some point. Sometimes he wondered if he still had any regenerations left or not after the 11th. He really wasn't sure and River certainly wouldn't tell him. “She won't tell me anything,” he grumbled like a small child.

River had said "My Doctor" at the Library. “Am I him?” he wondered as he got dressed. “Does she like this young face with the huge chin?” He thought about Rose, that he no longer had the face that Rose loved. When he thought about Rose, he realized it didn't hurt near as badly now. He hoped she was happy with that half human Doctor and he knew she would be. That guy looked like Her Doctor, he _was_ Her Doctor, and the man currently tying a bow tie around his neck wasn't any more.

But River was another thing entirely. If he was now “her Doctor”, what would that mean? Would this be the face that took her to the Singing Towers? He felt sick again at the thought. Well, he could change that. He was the Doctor, 900 year old Time Lord, who bent time to his will. His fate wasn't sealed. He could do whatever he wanted.

He dressed in his new suit of borrowed clothes and found River in the kitchen. When he came in she handed him a cup. “The Old Girl let me know you were up and about and thought you might like some tea.” He took a sip and it was perfect, just what he needed, and it was apparently just the way this body liked it. So she even knew how he took his tea. Wasn't that just lovely?

“You are probably starving too, aren't you?” At his nod, she went and got the custard she had made earlier out of the fridge. “There are other things you like besides fish fingers and custard, but I figured that's where you would want to start.” The Doctor grumbled under his breath at her as she got the fish fingers out of the warmer. Why did she have to be here and be so smug and smart and know everything about him when he didn't even know it yet himself?

He ate his fish fingers and custard in silence while she sipped her tea. Suddenly, he couldn't take it anymore and shoved them away. “Why are you here?” he asked her angrily. “Come to gloat about all your knowledge of me and my future? It's my very first day, River! That's rather rude, isn't it? And what, did the TARDIS bring me to your _back garden_? Great, two smug women controlling my life from day one!” 

Rivers eyes widened in surprise. What had happened when she met the Tenth Doctor that made him react to her this way? She knew the young Eleventh could get very irritated with her but he was never this angry with her. His eyes were hard and there was no soft feeling in them, none at all. 

The Doctor saw the pain and fear run across River's face and he instantly regretted what he had said. This was River Song, brave, smart, fascinating River Song who had sacrificed herself in the Library because she loved him. River Song who had held him when he was scared and kissed his pain away. When River got up from her chair and went to leave, the Doctor grabbed her hand and stopped her. 

He looked up into her eyes and realized he was scared, more scared than he had been in a long time. Standing before him was a woman who would be his wife, who he would give his name to, and who would die too young in his place. Seeing the whole of the situation and it's inevitability was scarier than any Dalek he had ever faced. “Sorry,” he muttered and turned away, afraid to betray what he was thinking.

River touched his hair, hesitantly. She knew the young Doctor was afraid of her, he had told her he would be. She knew what he needed, he needed to get moving. “So the TARDIS, she changed the desktop when you regenerated, yes?” 

“Yes, I sort of crashed her,” he released her hand and gave her a crooked smile. “She was pretty torn up.”

“Well, she's perfect now. You probably want to give her a good run, yes? You know, the last time I was on Yawalt I heard about a gang of rebel cyborgs who were terrorizing a small town. Stealing, looting, raping when they could. I am quite capable with a gun you know, but I need a driver. Care to help me teach them a lesson?”

“You know, we could talk to them first....” the Doctor said, uncomfortable with the idea of helping River shoot anything. River just rolled her eyes and pulled him to the control room.

“So, have you figured out how to fly her yet?” River taunted over her shoulder. 

“How to fly her?” the Doctor sputtered, his arms flailing about. “She's my ship! Of course I know how to fly her!” River just nodded and went to the console and started inputting coordinates. The Doctor tried to push her away but she pushed back against him and he realized he kind of liked it when she pushed her hip against him, even if she was an annoying know it all. “Stop it, River! You are messing up everything.”

“Make me,” she said, raising one eyebrow at him, seeing if he would take the bait.

“Yeah, well maybe I will,” he said back, his voice a bit lower, surprising himself. 

River smiled and said even lower “I'd like to see you try.”

The Doctor opened his mouth to speak, but then closed it again. He turned away mumbling to himself and flipped a few switches.

\----------

When they landed in front of the small house in the desert, River let the Doctor think he had convinced her to let him go in first and give the cyborgs a chance to stop on their own. But very quickly the Doctor found himself locked in a room with several young women who looked as if they had been beaten multiple times. He looked at the women and was immediately angry. He used his sonic to release their chains and unlock the door. Just after he unlocked the door he heard a loud explosion and knew River had decided she had waited long enough. He and the women ran out of the house and straight for the TARDIS as River shot at the men who were also running from the house. Several of the men reached their small flying cycles and the Doctor gave chase in the TARDIS, with River shooting from the open door. 

He showed one of the women what to hold to keep the TARDIS steady as they flew over the desert, chasing the small agile cycles. The Doctor was watching River when without warning she jumped out of the open door. He screamed her name and ran toward the spot she had been. When he reached the door, he saw her on the back of one of the cycles, wrestling with the rider. She twisted just so and threw him off the side of the cycle, the man hitting the ground with a hard thud. The Doctor leaned out the door, reaching for River to help her back in. She grabbed his hand and let him pull her back up into the TARDIS. She landed next to him with shout of triumph and he looked down at her. She was smiling – her hair wild, her eyes dancing, her cheeks flushed – and the Doctor wondered if he had ever seen a woman who looked more beautiful. 

“Don't do that again!” he chastised her before hugging her against him. Feeling her against him was nice, and he had been so frightened when she disappeared out of the door. The Doctor released her before he could think about why he had been so scared and turned and went back to the controls. They chased down all the thugs, River taking care of most of them. The Doctor didn't know how he felt about that. Those men were horrible, for sure. He had seen the injuries on the women who were now huddled together talking to River, and he couldn't deny that he _had_ given them a chance.....

The TARDIS landed in the small town and the women thanked them profusely, offering them anything they wanted in thanks. River and the Doctor waived them off toward the police station and as soon as the women had their backed turned, the TARDIS dematerialized and they were gone.

\---------

The Doctor input the coordinates to return River home and when he went to the other side of the console, River went over and fixed them. He did not know what to say to her now. He didn't want to compliment her on her excellent shooting skills. He didn't want to tell her how vibrant and beautiful she was. But he also didn't want to fight with her any more either. So he stayed silent, as they piloted the ship together back to the Moon.

When they landed, River touched his hand. “Stay right here Doctor, please. I have a gift for you.” He nodded and she dashed off out of the TARDIS. He wanted to go to the door and take a peek and see her house on the Moon, how it looked, how she lived, but he knew it was spoilers. For all he knew, an older version of him was sitting in her kitchen right now having perfect tea made by her. 

River came back quickly with something behind her back. She stood very close to him and touched his bow tie with her free hand. “Good first run?” she asked.

Again, he ran over in his mind all the things he wanted to say to her, but couldn't. He just nodded. “Yeah, good first run. Thank you, Professor Song.”

She smiled at him and reached up and kissed him on the cheek. She took his hand and gave him her gift. A package of Jammie Dodgers. 

“Jammie Dodgers?” the Doctor asked, not really sure what she meant by giving him the biscuits.

River turned to go. “You like them. Quite a lot actually,” she said over her shoulder. When she reached the door, she stopped. “Keep one in your pocket, Sweetie. You never know when it will come in handy.” She blew him a kiss and then she was gone.

The Doctor looked down that the package of biscuits and then quickly tore it open. He ate one and it was delicious. She was right, he did like it quite a lot. He liked River too, quite a lot. But that was something to explore another day. For now, there was a young Scottish woman he had made a promise to. “Let's go show Amy the stars,” he said to the TARDIS and off they went.

**Author's Note:**

> For my story where River kisses the 10th's Doctor's pain away - click [Here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1126932/chapters/2272323)


End file.
